Passion: The Missing Democratic Party Variable; The Ineffective Centrist-Democrat Movement
by Katherine Brengle
Last month's Presidential election threw the Democratic party into a frenzy. What did we do wrong? What should we do to regain status as a national party? Why aren't our candidates and platform connecting with middle America? How can we fix these problems before the 2006 midterm elections?
The Democrats are already returning to their now classic strategy for bouncing back from a lost election--racing each other toward the center at breakneck speed. No matter how many times they do this, and how many times it fails, they keep on going back.
You see, Democrats lack one key characteristic that Republicans have had and held on to no matter what--passion. Conservatives, no matter how much I disagree with their politics, are take-no-prisoners, guts and glory passionate about every word that comes out of their mouths. They are consistent, they don't give in, and they couldn't give a damn about people they know will never vote for them. Democrats, on the other hand, are traditionally much more willing to compromise, flat out give in, and try to be as likable as possible--even if it means sacrificing their ideals.
Republicans don't compromise until every last card has been played, and evangelical Christians, an exponentially growing part of the Conservative base, don't compromise at all. They keep their eyes on the ball, come Hell or high water.
Democrats count on dwindling support from a number of previously reliable demographics. Republicans saw opportunity in the new Christian revival in this country, and they did everything they could to bring them into the fold.
Evangelical Christians take
comfort in the moral values stance of these conservative candidates, and
also in the fact that many of these candidates come from, or at least
purport to come from, the same background of faith and family.
In November's Republican victory, national exit polls showed that 22
percent of voters cited "moral values" as their key issue. 20
percent cited economic issues, 19 percent cited terrorism as the number
one motivation for their vote, and the smallest percentage, 15 percent,
voted based on the issue of the war in Iraq--an issue that the
Democratic party pushed more than any other in many instances, and which
turned out to be less important to voters than the other key issues of
the campaign. Of the 22 percent of voters who cited moral values as
their most important issue, 79 percent voted for President Bush.
26 million evangelical Christians turned out to vote in the Presidential
election this year--a much larger number than we have grown accustomed
to. At 26 million, these voters made up 23 percent of the total
electorate on November 2nd. These voters were mobilized for President
Bush mainly by church-based networks closely coordinated with the Bush
campaign. Barrie Lynn, leader of Americans United for the Separation of
Church and State, said in response to this phenomenon, "The big sea
change was how many local churches and small-fry evangelical preachers
entered the effort to get Bush elected. That you didn't see before"
(Washington Post, 11/4/04). Another contributing factor, many believe,
is the Christian novel series Left Behind, which I have
personally read (all 12 volumes) and which fuses faith and politics
seamlessly. Lynn also claims this as a contributing factor to the new
political interest of evangelical Christians, saying, "There is a
strain of evangelical Christians who believe it is political figured who
usher in the Second Coming," and called President Bush "the
spiritual and political leader of a moral revolution."
Many of these culturally conservative voters, on the other hand, saw Senator John Kerry (D-Massachusetts) as an elitist and many considered him untrustworthy. He was the epitome of a wealthy, New England intellectual, and they had trouble connecting with him on a human level.
Many Democrats, in classic Democrat fashion, are pushing for yet another rightward shift for the party. They are trying to weasel moral values into their own politics, to adjust. This show of faith, or at least the illusion of faith, is not going to fool evangelical voters--and it will alienate secularist Democratic voters.
A more effective line for the
Dems to toe is a return to base Democratic values. Old school Democratic
values are easy to get fired up about, because they address everything
that average Americans really care about. Traditional Democratic
platforms were tough on corporate and political corruption, tough on
environmental protection, and presented candidates that could easily
relate to the common man.
The Democratic party, historically, has stood up for the average
American. It has supported workers, fair wages, adequate education, and
more generally, all American citizens from the lower class and middle
class. The increasing economic comfort of the middle class has shied
those voters from the Democratic rolls, and the growth of faith-based
voting in the lower classes has driven enough voters to the Republican
Party to make the growth of the lower class itself null and void as far
as voting is concerned.
Demographics that the Democrats once counted on as parts of their base--minorities (including women), blue-collar workers, gays and lesbians, young voters, urban voters, and intellectuals--are shrinking. More minorities are being lured to the Conservative movement by the evangelical messages of neo-conservative candidates. Many are switching sides based on cultural issues such as abortion and gay marriage. The same goes for all of these key groups--faith-based politics are infiltrating all of the demographics that Democrats once thought locked down. The group least affected by this phenomenon seems to be intellectuals, but simultaneously this once respected sector of the American citizenry is losing respect amongst voters.
The solution for Democrats is
to backtrack to the era of populist politics they once championed. If
the Democrats can sit still and think straight for a moment, stop the
race toward the center, and remember what they are supposed to be doing,
they can take back this country. The Democratic leadership needs to take
note of Dems like Rep. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont), Rep. Peter DeFazio
(D-Oregon), Rep, Gene Taylor (D-Mississippi), Brian Schweitzer
(D-Montana, first Democratic governor elected in Montana in 16 years),
Rep. Mike Michaud (D-Maine), Rep. Ted Strickland (D-Ohio), Rep. Tim
Holden (D-Pennsylvania), Rep. David Obey (D-Wisconsin), Sen. Byron
Dorgan (D-N. Dakota), Rep. Stephanie Herseth (D-S. Dakota), Rep. John
Salazar (D-Colorado), Sen. Ken Salazar (D-Colorado), Atty. Gen. Eliot
Spitzer (D-New York),and Atty. Gen. Janet Napolitano (D-Arizona).
All of these Democrats (and Sanders, a self-proclaimed Socialist, and
the only Independent in the House) used populist messages to get
elected. They spoke to their constituents in plain terms about the
problems with free trade, corporate crime and monopoly, corruption in
politics, environmental issues (Schweitzer explained the impact of
pollution on hunting and fishing to gain votes in Montana), and in more
rural areas, the need to protect family farms from the proliferation of
corporate factory farming. They used the issues that they knew in their
hearts were most important to their constituents, framing them in the
same way that Conservatives frame issues like abortion and gay
rights--in a moral light--when necessary. Issues like corporate crime
and political corruption were framed in a moral light by politicians
like Schweitzer, Bean, John Lynch of New Hampshire, Sanders, Obey and
Dorgan, and they saw results.
If the Democratic leadership will start paying attention to the way
these Democrats are winning elections without sacrificing their ideals,
there is a possibility for serious and lasting change in the party.
Making a big show of religious faith and giving away more and more of
their economic agenda is not going to produce any results. If the party
continues on that course, in a few elections, they will be
Republicans--what is the rationale behind that?
Now, not all of these Democrats are social libertarians--some are pro-gun and pro-life--but that illustrates my point perfectly. It is not antithetical to cultural conservatives to support progressive economic and environmental policies and candidates. It is not antithetical to progressive politics to be culturally conservative. The Democrats need to realize that you can be progressive and still have strong moral values, and even speak them to your constituents. The most important virtue lacking in the Democratic leadership today is passion. Politicians should be passionate about their policies--and that is one thing that the Republican party has got down pat. Dems--decide what you stand for, and stand by your decision. If the Democrats think that this Republican-lite style is satisfying their base, they are sadly mistaken.
Also, throwing Democratic
challengers at Conservative candidates and arming them with an anti-big
business, anti-free trade, pro-worker, pro-environment platform framed
in plain spoken terms will virtually incapacitate the Republican party.
The right relies on major corporate donors for the majority of its
campaign funding, whereas Democrats raise much more of their money from
everyday folks like you and me. Senator Kerry raised upwards of $70
million from donors giving $200 or less. If the Democrats get big
business out of their politics, there is no way that the Conservatives
can meet them halfway with empty compromises like they usually do. The
Dems will have the upper hand, and they will actually win
elections.
The key to grabbing those cultural conservative votes is to stop playing
into Conservative's hands on their so-called moral issues, and instead
frame the real issues in a moral light--as they should be. Is it
moral to support corporate welfare while families live in poverty?
Is it moral to put family farms out of business in favor of filthy
corporate factory farms? We already know that cultural
conservatives abhor political and corporate corruption--they just
haven't learned to see the forest for the trees when it comes to the
current Republican leadership.
If the Democrats can just get on board and stop trying to appease the opposition, they have a chance for real change. The Democratic leadership, however, continues to slither toward the center regardless of how ineffective this method of gaining votes has been. They refuse to learn from history. Democratic centrists like Joe Lieberman (D-Connecticut) are part of the problem, since they refuse to acknowledge the futility of giving up on traditional Democratic values in favor of centrism.
Many cite Bill Clinton's 8 year stint in the White House as an indicator that centrist politics do produce results. I beg to differ. While Clinton was a close-to-center moderate during his time in office, he ran his first campaign on a strong populist message. He spoke about corporate corruption and the negatives of free trade without intensive regulation, won the election by a wide margin, and then proceeded to reduce corporate regulation and champion free trade. It was Clinton's populist campaigning that got him elected--once he was in office, he played to the Republican agenda like a typical Democrat.
We have to force our elected officials to make good on their campaign promises. Many of us sacrifice time with our families and pursuing our personal goals to give our blood, sweat, and tears to these guys in Washington. Make them give theirs to us. We can't keep putting the same people in positions of power if they are going to sell us down the river as soon as they take office. We have all of the passion in this party right now--if they aren't doing things our way, we should be endorsing and voting for new candidates.
The Dems should be proud and grateful that they have these people on their side. These Dems realize that in order to win, they need to return to a populist platform, get away from all this abortion/gay marriage/etc bunk, and make some real progress.
Anyone who isn't on board is going to have some trouble, I'd say, when the 20-somethings of today get older and start running for office. My advice? Jump on the populist wagon, because it's headed for the White House, one of these days.
Katherine Brengle libgal81@aol.com is a 23 year old student at the University of Massachusetts . She is an aspiring nonfiction writer and this is the first article she's submitted for publication.
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